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FINDELKIND 


Works of 

Louisa de la Rame 

(^^Ouida'O 

Findelkind 

Muriella 

A Dog of Flanders 
The Numberg Stove 
A Provence Rose 
Two Little Wooden Shoes 

L. C. PAGE AND COMPANY 

(Incorporated) 

200 Summer St*» Boston, Mass* 





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“ ‘ JUST LIKE YOU,’ SAID THE GOOD MAN.” 

{See page 8.) 


Cosj) Comer Scries 


FINDELKIND 


/ By 

Louise de la Ramee 

(Ouida) 


Illustrated by 
E. B. Barry 



Boston ^ ^ ^ ^ 

L. C. Page & Company 
^ ^ ^ igoi 


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THE LIIWAHV OF 
CONCRESS. 
Two Cornu Rcccived 

AUG. 23 1901 


COFVRWHT e«T«Y 

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CLAn^XXc N«. 

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COPY a 


Copyright, igoi 
By L. C. Page & Company 

(incorporated) 

All rights reserved 


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Electrotyped and Printed by C. H. Simonds & Co. 
Boston. Mass.. U. S. A. 


“‘Just like you,’ said the good man 




Frontispiece 

“ He would study day and night ” . . 5 

“ Knocking so loudly at castle gates ” . 1 1 ^ 

“When he went for water, he spilt one- 

half ” 16 ^ 

“Even his dear sheep he hardly heeded” 17 
“ The old man’s face scowled and grew 


DARK ” ....... 29 

‘An orderly sprang from his saddle” . 37 v 

“Boy of mine! were you mad?”’ . . 451^ 

‘It was very feeble and faint” . . - 57 ^ 

‘ Once a great sob shook him ” . . . 60 ^ 



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4 



FINDELKIND 


There was a little boy, a year or two ago, 
who lived under the shadow of Martinswand. 
Most people know, I should suppose, that the 
Martinswand is that mountain in the Oberinn- 
thal, where, several centuries past, brave Kaiser 
Max lost his footing as he stalked the chamois, 
and fell upon a ledge of rock, and stayed there, 
in mortal peril, for thirty hours, till he was res- 
cued by the strength and agility of a Tyrol hun- 
ter, — an angel in the guise of a hunter, as the 
chronicles of the time prefer to say. 

The Martinswand is a grand mountain, being 
one of the spurs of the greater Sonnstein, and 
rises precipitously, looming, massive and lofty, 
like a very fortress for giants, where it stands 
right across that road which, if you follow it 
long enough, takes you through Zell to Lan- 

I 


2 


FINDELKIND. 


deck, — old, picturesque, poetic Landeck, where 
Frederick of the Empty Pockets rhymed his 
sorrows in ballads to his people, — and so on 
by Bludenz into Switzerland itself, by as noble 
a highway as any traveller can ever desire to 
traverse on a summer’s day. It is within a 
mile of the little burg of Zell, where the people, 
in the time of their emperor’s peril, came out 
with torches and bells, and the Host lifted up 
by their priest, and all prayed on their knees 
underneath the steep, gaunt pile of limestone, 
that is the same to-day as it was then, whilst 
Kaiser Max is dust ; it soars up on one side of 
this road, very steep and very majestic, having 
bare stone at its base, and being all along its 
summit crowned with pine woods ; and on the 
other side of the road are a little stone church, 
quaint and low, and gray with age, and a stone 
farmhouse, and cattle-sheds, and timber-sheds, 
all of wood that is darkly brown from time ; 
and beyond these are some of the most beauti- 
ful meadows in the world, full of tall grass and 
countless flowers, with pools and little estuaries 
made by the brimming Inn River that flows by 
them ; and beyond the river are the glaciers 
of the Sonnstein and the Selrain and the wild 


FINDELKIND. 


3 


Arlberg region, and the golden glow of sunset 
in the west, most often seen from here through 
the veil of falling rain. 

At this farmhouse, with Martinswand tower- 
ing above it, and Zell a mile beyond, there lived, 
and lives still, a little boy who bears the old 
historical name of Findelkind, whose father, 
Otto Korner, is the last of a sturdy race of 
yeomen, who had fought with Hofer and Has- 
pinger, and had been free men always. 

Findelkind came in the middle of seven other 
children, and was a pretty boy of nine years, 
with slenderer limbs and paler cheeks than his 
rosy brethren, and tender dreamy eyes that had 
the look, his mother told him, of seeking stars 
in midday : de chercher midi d qtiatorze heureSy 
as the French have it. He was a good little 
lad, and seldom gave any trouble from disobedi- 
ence, though he often gave it from forgetful- 
ness. His father angrily complained that he 
was always in the clouds, — that is, he was 
always dreaming, and so very often would spill 
the milk out of the pails, chop his own fingers 
instead of the wood, and stay watching the 
swallows when he was sent to draw water. 
His brothers and sisters were always making 


4 


FINDELKIND. 


fun of him ; they were sturdier, ruddier, and 
merrier children than he was, loved romping 
and climbing, and nutting, thrashing the walnut- 
trees and sliding down snow-drifts, and got into 
mischief of a more common and childish sort 
than Findelkind’s freaks of fancy. For, indeed, 
he was a very fanciful little boy: everything 
around had tongues for him ; and he would sit 
for hours among the long rushes on the river’s 
edge, trying to imagine what the wild green- 
gray water had found in its wanderings, and 
asking the water-rats and the ducks to tell him 
about it ; but both rats and ducks were too 
busy to attend to an idle little boy, and never 
spoke, which vexed him. 

Findelkind, however, was very fond of his 
books : he would study day and night, in his 
little ignorant, primitive fashion. He loved 
his missal and his primer, and could spell 
them both out very fairly, and was learning 
to write of a good priest in Zirl, where he 
trotted three times a week with his two little 
brothers. When not at school, he was chiefly 
set to guard the sheep and the cows, which 
occupation left him very much to himself, so 
that he had many hours in the summer-time 



“HE WOULD STUDY DAY AND NIGHT 


9 ? 



FINDELKIND. 


7 


to Stare up to the skies and wonder — wonder 
— wonder about all sorts of things ; while in 
the winter — the long, white, silent winter, 
when the post-wagons ceased to run, and the 
road into Switzerland was blocked, and the 
whole world seemed asleep, except for the roar- 
ing of the winds — Findelkind, who still trotted 
over the snow to school in Zirl, would dream 
still, sitting on the wooden settle by the fire, 
when he came home again under Mart ins wand. 
For the worst — or the best — of it all was that 
he was Findelkind. 

This is what was always haunting him. He 
was Findelkind ; and to bear this name seemed 
to him to mark him out from all other children, 
and to dedicate him to heaven. One day, three 
years before, when he had been only six years 
old, the priest in Zirl, who was a very kindly 
and cheerful man, and amused the children as 
much as he taught them, had not allowed Fin- 
delkind to leave school to go home, because the 
storm of snow and wind was so violent, but had 
kept him until the worst should pass, with one 
or two other little lads who lived some way off, 
and had let the boys roast a meal of apples and 
chestnuts by the stove in his little room, and. 


8 


FINDELKIND. 


while the wind howled and the blinding snow 
fell without, had told the children the story 
of another Findelkind, — an earlier Findelkind, 
who had lived in the flesh on Arlberg as far 
back as 1381, and had been a little shepherd 
lad, “just like you,” said the good man, looking 
at the little boys munching their roast crabs, 
and whose country had been over there, above 
Stuben, where Danube and Rhine meet and 
part. 

The pass of Arlberg is even still so bleak 
and bitter that few care to climb there ; the 
mountains around are drear and barren, and 
snow lies till midsummer, and even longer some- 
times. “ But in the early ages,” said the priest 
(and this is quite a true tale that the children 
heard with open eyes, and mouths only not 
open because they were full of crabs and chest- 
nuts), “in the early ages,” said the priest to 
them, “the Arlberg was far more dreary than 
it is now. There was only a mule-track over it, 
and no refuge for man or beast ; so that wander- 
ers and peddlers, and those whose need for 
work or desire for battle brought them over 
that frightful pass, perished in great numbers, 
and were eaten by the bears and the wolves. 


FiNDELKiNp. 9 

The little shepherd boy Findelkind — who was 
a little boy five hundred years ago, remember,” 
the priest repeated — was sorely disturbed 
and distressed to see these poor dead souls in 
the snow winter after winter, and seeing the 
blanched bones lie on the bare earth, unburied, 
when summer melted the snow. It made him 
unhappy, very unhappy ; and what could he do, 
he a little boy keeping sheep ? He had as his 
wages two florins a year ; that was all ; but his 
heart rose high, and he had faith in God, Little 
as he was, he said to himself he would try and 
do something, so that year after year those poor 
lost travellers and beasts should not perish so. 
He said nothing to anybody, but he took the 
few florins he had saved up^, bade his master 
farewell, and went on his way begging, — a 
little fourteenth century boy, with long, straight 
hair, and a girdled tunic, as you see them,” 
continued the priest, “in the miniatures in the 
black-letter missal that lies upon my desk. No 
doubt heaven favoured him very strongly, and 
the saints watched over him ; still, without the 
boldness of his own courage, and the faith in 
his own heart, they would not have done so. I 
suppose, too, that when knights in their armour, 


lO 


FINDELKIND. 


and soldiers in their camps, saw such a little 
fellow all alone, they helped him, and perhaps 
struck some blows for him, and so sped him on 
his way, and protected him from robbers and 
from wild beasts. Still, be sure that the real 
shield and the real reward that served Findel- 
kind of Arlberg was the pure and noble purpose 
that armed him night and day. Now, history 
does not tell us where Findclkind went, nor 
how he fared, nor how long he was about it ; 
but history does tell us that the little barefooted, 
long-haired boy, knocking so loudly at castle 
gates and city walls in the name of Christ and 
Christ’s poor brethren, did so well succeed in 
his quest that before long he had returned to 
his mountain home with means to have a church 
and a rude dwelling built, where he lived with 
six other brave and charitable souls, dedicating 
themselves to St. Christopher, and going out 
night and day to the sound of the Angelus, 
seeking the lost and weary. This is really what 
Findelkind of Arlberg did five centuries ago, 
and did so quickly that his fraternity of St. 
Christopher, twenty years after, numbered 
among its members archdukes, and prelates, 
and knights without number, and lasted as a 



“ KNOCKING SO LOUDLY AT CASTLE GATES. 



FINDELKIND. 


13 


great order down to the days of Joseph II. 
This is what Findelkind in the fourteenth cen- 
tury did, I tell you. Bear like faith in your 
hearts, my children ; and though your genera- 
tion is a harder one than this, because it is 
without faith, yet you shall move mountains, 
because Christ and St. Christopher will be with 
you.” 

Then the good man, having said that, blessed 
them, and left them alone to their chestnuts 
and crabs, and went into his own oratory to 
prayer. The other boys laughed and chattered ; 
but Findelkind sat very quietly, thinking of his 
namesake, all the day after, and for many days 
and weeks and months this story haunted him. 
A little boy had done all that ; and this little 
boy had been called Findelkind : Findelkind, 
just like himself. 

It was beautiful, and yet it tortured him. If 
the good man had known how the history would 
root itself in the child’s mind, perhaps he would 
never have told it ; for night and day it vexed 
Findelkind, and yet seemed beckoning to him 
and crying, ‘‘ Go thou and do likewise ! ” 

But what could he do .? 

There was the snow, indeed, and there were 


14 


FINDELKIND. 


the mountains, as in the fourteenth century, but 
there were no travellers lost. The diligence 
did not go into Switzerland after autumn, and 
the country people who went by on their mules 
and in their sledges to Innspruck knew their 
way very well, and were never likely to be adrift 
on a winter’s night, or eaten by a wolf or a 
bear. 

When spring came, Findelkind sat by the 
edge of the bright pure water among the flow- 
ering grasses, and felt his heart heavy. Findel- 
kind of Arlberg who was in heaven now must 
look down, he fancied, and think him so stupid 
and so selfish, sitting there. The first Findel- 
kind, a few centuries before, had trotted down 
on his bare feet from his mountain pass, and 
taken his little crook, and gone out boldly over 
all the land on his pilgrimage, and knocked at 
castle gates and city walls in Christ’s name, and 
for love of the poor ! That was to do some- 
thing indeed ! 

This poor little living Findelkind would look 
at the miniatures in the priest’s missal, in one 
of which there was the little fourteenth-century 
boy, with long hanging hair and a wallet and 
bare feet, and he never doubted that it was the 


FINDELKIND. 


15 


portmit of the blessed Findelkind who was in 
heaven; and he wondered if he looked like a 
little boy there, or if he were changed to the 
likeness of an angel. 

He was a boy just like me,^’ thought the 
poor little fellow, and he felt so ashamed of 
himself, — so very ashamed ; and the priest 
had told him to try and do the same. He 
brooded over it so much, and it made him so 
anxious and so vexed, that his brothers ate his 
porridge and he did not notice it, his sisters 
pulled his curls and he did not feel it, his father 
brought a stick down on his back, and he only 
started and stared, and his mother cried because 
he was losing his mind, and would grow daft, 
and even his mother’s tears he scarcely saw. 
He was always thinking of Findelkind in 
heaven. 

When he went for water, he spilt one-half ; 
when he did his lessons, he forgot the chief 
part ; when he drove out the cow, he let her 
munch the cabbages ; and when he was set to 
watch the oven he let the loaves burn, like 
great Alfred. He was always busied thinking. 
Little Findelkind that is in heaven did so great 
a thing : why may not I I ought ! I ought ! ” 


i6 


FINDELKIND. 


What was the use of being named after Find- 
elkind that was in heaven, unless one did 

something great, 
too ? " 

Next to the 
church there is 
a little stone 
lodge, or shed, 
with two arched 
openings, and 
from it you look 
into the tiny 
church, with its 
crucifixes and 
relics, or out to 
great, bold, som- 
bre Martinswand, 
as you like best ; 
and in this spot 
Findelkind would 
sit hour after 
hour while h i s 
brothers and sis- 
ters were playing, and look up at the moun- 
tains or on to the altar, and wish and pray 
and vex his little soul most wofully ; and his 




“ EVEN HIS DEAR SHEEP HE HARDLY HEEDED.” 






FINDELKIND. 


19 


ewes and his lambs would crop the grass 
about the entrance, and bleat to make him 
notice them and lead them farther afield, but 
all in vain. Even his dear sheep he hardly 
heeded, and his pet ewes, Katte and Greta, 
and the big ram Zips, rubbed their soft noses 
in his hand unnoticed. So the summer droned 
away, — the summer that is so short in the 
mountains, and yet so green and so radiant, 
with the torrents tumbling through the flowers, 
and the hay tossing in the meadows, and the 
lads and lasses climbing to cut the rich, sweet 
grass of the alps. The short summer passed as 
fast as a dragon-fly flashes by, all green and 
gold, in the sun ; and it was near winter once 
more, and still Findelkind was always dreaming 
and wondering what he could do for the good 
of St. Christopher ; and the longing to do it all 
came more and more into his little heart, and 
he puzzled his brain till his head ached. One 
autumn morning, whilst yet it was dark, Findel- 
kind made his mind up, and rose before his 
brothers, and stole down-stairs and out into the 
air, as it was easy to do, because the house-door 
never was bolted. He had nothing with him ; 
he was barefooted, and his school-satchel was 


20 


FINDELKIND. 


slung behind him, as Findelkind of Arlberg’s 
wallet had been five centuries before. 

He took a little staff from the piles of wood 
lying about, and went out on to the highroad, 
on his way to do heaven’s will. He was not 
very sure what that divine will wished, but that 
was because he was only nine years old, and not 
very wise ; but Findelkind that was in heaven 
had begged for the poor ; so would he. 

His parents were very poor, but he did not 
think of them as in any want at any time, be- 
cause he always had his bowlful of porridge and 
as much bread as he wanted to eat. This 
morning he had nothing to eat ; he wished to 
be away before any one could question him. 

It was quite dusk in the fresh autumn morn- 
ing. The sun had not risen behind the glaciers 
of the Stubaithal, and the road was scarcely 
seen ; but he knew it very well, and he set out 
bravely, saying his prayers to Christ, and to St. 
Christopher, and to Findelkind that was in 
heaven. 

He was not in any way clear as to what he 
would do, but he thought he would find some 
great thing to do somewhere, lying like, a jewel 
in the dust ; and he went on his way in faith. 


FINDELKIND. 


21 


as Findelkind of Arlberg had done before 
him. 

His heart beat high, and his head lost its 
aching pains, and his feet felt light ; so light as 
if there were wings to his ankles. He would 
not go to Zirl, because Zirl he knew so well, 
and there could be nothing very wonderful wait- 
ing there ; and he ran fast the other way. 
When he was fairly out from under the shadow 
of Martins wand, he slackened his pace, and saw 
the sun come on his path, and the red day red- 
den the gray-green water, and the early Stell- 
wagen from Landeck, that had been lumbering 
along all the night, overtook him. 

He would have run after it, and called out to 
the travellers for alms, but he felt ashamed. 
His father had never let him beg, and he did 
not know how to begin. 

The Stellwagen rolled on through the autumn 
mud, and that was one chance lost. He was 
sure that the first Findelkind had not felt 
ashamed when he had knocked at the first 
castle gates. 

By and by, when he could not see Martins- 
wand by turning his head back ever so, he came 
to an inn that used to be a post-house in the old 


22 


FINDELKIND. 


days when men travelled only by road. A woman 
was feeding chickens in the bright clear red of 
the cold daybreak. 

Findelkind timidly held out his hand. “For 
the poor ! ” he murmured, and doffed his cap. 

The old woman looked at him sharply. “ Oh, 
is it you, little Findelkind .? Have you run off 
from school.'* Be off with you home! I have 
mouths enough to feed here.” 

Findelkind went away, and began to learn 
that it is not easy to be a prophet or a hero in 
one’s own country. 

He trotted a mile farther, and met nothing. 
At last he came to some cows by the wayside, 
and a man tending them. 

“ Would you give me something to help make 
a monastery.?” he said, timidly, and once more 
took off his cap. The man gave a great laugh. 
“ A fine monk, you ! And who wants more of 
these lazy drones.? Not I.” 

Findelkind never answered : he remembered 
the priest had said that the years he lived in 
were very hard ones, and men in them had no 
faith. 

Ere long he came to a big walled house, with 
turrets and grated casements, — very big it 


FINDELKIND. 


23 


looked to him, — like one of the first Findel- 
kind’s own castles. His heart beat loud against 
his side, but he plucked up his courage, and 
knocked as loud as his heart was beating. 

He knocked and knocked, but no answer 
came. The house was empty. But he did not 
know that ; he thought it was that the people 
within were cruel, and he went sadly onward 
with the road winding before him, and on his 
right the beautiful impetuous gray river, and on 
his left the green Mittelgebirge and the moun- 
tains that rose behind it. By this time the day 
was up ; the sun was glowing on the red of the 
cranberry shrubs, and the blue of the bilberry- 
boughs : he was hungry and thirsty and tired. 
But he did not give in for that ; he held on 
steadily ; he knew that there was near, some- 
where near, a great city that the people called 
Sprugg, and thither he had resolved to go. By 
noontide he had walked eight miles, and came 
to a green place where men were shooting at 
targets, the tall, thick grass all around them ; 
and a little way farther off was a train of people 
chanting and bearing crosses, and dressed in 
long flowing robes. 

The place was the Hottinger Au, and the 


24 


FINDELKIND. 


day was Saturday, and the village was mak- 
ing ready to perform a miracle-play on the 
morrow. 

Findelkind ran to the robed singing-folk, 
quite sure that he saw the people of God. 
“ Oh, take me, take me ! ” he cried to them ; 
“do take me with you to do heaven’s work.” 

But they pushed him aside for a crazy little 
boy that spoiled their rehearsing. 

“ It is only for Hotting folk,” said a lad older 
than himself. “ Get out of the way with you, 
Liebcheny And the man who carried the cross 
knocked him with force on the head, by mere 
accident ; but Findelkind thought he had 
meant it. 

Were people so much kinder five centuries 
before, he wondered, and felt sad as the many- 
coloured robes swept on through the grass, and 
the crack of the rifles sounded sharply through 
the music of the chanting voices. He went on, 
footsore and sorrowful, thinking of the castle 
doors that had opened, and the city gates that 
had unclosed, at the summons of the little long- 
haired boy whose figure was painted on the 
missal. 

He had come now to where the houses were 


FINDELKIND. 


25 


much more numerous, though under the shade 
of great trees, — lovely old gray houses, some of 
wood, some of stone, some with frescoes on them 
and gold and colour and mottoes, some with 
deep barred casements, and carved portals, and 
sculptured figures ; houses of the poorer people 
now, but still memorials of a grand and gracious 
time. For he had wandered into the quarter of 
St. Nicholas in this fair mountain city, which 
he, like his country-folk, called Sprugg, though 
the government calls it Innspruck. 

He got out upon a long, gray, wooden bridge, 
and looked up and down the reaches of the 
river, and thought to himself, maybe this was 
not Sprugg but Jerusalem, so beautiful it looked 
with its domes shining golden in the sun, and 
the snow of the Soldstein and Branjoch behind 
them. For little Findelkind had never come so 
far as this before. As he stood on the bridge 
so dreaming, a hand clutched him, and a voice 
said : 

A whole kreutzer, or you do not pass ! ” 
Findelkind started and trembled. 

A kreutzer ! he had never owned such a 
treasure in all his life. 

“I have no money I” he murmured, timidly. 


26 


FINDELKIND. 


“ I came to see if I could get money for the 
poor.” 

The keeper of the bridge laughed. 

“You are a little beggar, you mean.-* Oh, 
very well ! Then over my bridge you do not 

go.” 

“ But it is the city on the other side ? ” 

“To be sure it is the city ; but over nobody 
goes without a kreutzer.” 

“ I never have such a thing of my own ! 
never ! never ! ” said Findelkind, ready to cry. 

“Then you were a little fool to come away 
from your home, wherever that may be,” said 
the man at the bridge-head. “Well, I will let 
you go, for you look a baby. But do not beg ; 
that is bad.” 

“ Findelkind did it ! ” 

“Then Findelkind was a rogue and a vaga- 
bond,” said the taker of tolls. 

“ Oh, no — no — no ! ” 

“Oh, yes — yes — yes, little sauce-box; and 
take that,” said the man, giving him a box on 
the ear, being angry at contradiction. 

Findelkind’s head drooped, and he went 
slowly over the bridge, forgetting that he 
ought to have thanked the toll-taker for a 


FINDELKIND. 


2 / 


free passage. The world seemed to him very 
difficult. How had Findelkind done when he 
had come to bridges i* — and, oh, how had Fin- 
delkind done when he had been hungry ? 

For this poor little Findelkind was getting 
very hungry, and his stomach was as empty as 
was his wallet. 

A few steps brought him to the Goldenes 
Dachl. 

He forgot his hunger and his pain, seeing 
the sun shine on all that gold, and the curious 
painted galleries under it. He thought it was 
real solid gold. Real gold laid out on a house- 
roof, — and the people all so poor ! Findelkind 
began to muse, and wonder why everybody did 
not climb up there and take a tile off and be 
rich ? But perhaps it would be wicked. Per- 
haps God put the roof there with all that gold 
to prove people. Findelkind got bewildered. 

If God did such a thing, was it kind ? 

His head seemed to swim, and the sunshine 
went round and round with him. There went 
by him, just then, a very venerable-looking old 
man with silver hair ; he was wrapped in a long 
cloak. Findelkind pulled at the coat gently, 
and the old man looked down. 


28 


FINDELKIND. 


“ What is it, my boy ? ” he asked. 

Findelkind answered, “ I came out to get 
gold : may I take it off that roof ? ” 

“ It is not gold, child, it is gilding.” 

‘‘ What is gilding ? ” 

It is a thing made to look like gold ; that is 

all.” 

“ It is a lie, then ! ” 

The old man smiled. ‘‘Well, nobody thinks 
so. If you like to put it so, perhaps it is. 
What do you want gold for, you wee thing ? ” 

“To build a monastery, and house the poor.” 

The old man’s face scowled and grew dark, 
for he was a Lutheran pastor from Bavaria. 

“Who taught you such trash.?” he said, 
crossly. 

“ It is not trash. It is faith.” 

And Findelkind’s face began to burn, and 
his blue eyes to darken and moisten. There 
was a little crowd beginning to gather, and the 
crowd was beginning to laugh. There were 
many soldiers and rifle-shooters in the throng, 
and they jeered and joked, and made fun of the 
old man in the long cloak, who grew angry 
then with the child. “You are a little idolater 
and a little impudent sinner ! ” he said, wrath- 




FINDELKIND. 


31 


fully, and shook the boy by the shoulder, and 
went away, and the throng that had gathered 
around had only poor Findelkind left to tease. 

He was a very poor little boy indeed to look 
at, with his sheepskin tunic, and his bare feet 
and legs, and his wallet that never was to get 
filled. 

“ Where do you come from, and what do you 
want ? ” they asked ; and he answered, with a 
sob in his voice : 

want to do like Findelkind of Arlberg.” 

And then the crowd laughed, not knowing at 
all what he meant, but laughing just because 
they did not know, as crowds always will do. 
And only the big dogs that are so very big in 
this country, and are all loose, and free, and 
good-natured citizens, came up to him kindly, 
and rubbed against him, and made friends ; and 
at that tears came into his eyes, and his courage 
ro.se, and he lifted his head. 

‘‘You are cruel people to laugh,” he said, 
indignantly ; “ the dogs are kinder. People 
did not laugh at Findelkind. He was a little 
boy just like me, no better and no bigger, and 
as poor, and yet he had so much faith, and 
the world then was so good, that he left hi$ 


32 


FJNDELKIND. 


sheep, and got money enough to build a church 
and a hospice to Christ and St. Christopher. 
And I want to do the same for the poor. Not 
for myself, no ; for the poor ! I am Findelkind 
too, and Findelkind of Arlberg that is in heaven 
speaks to me.” 

Then he stopped, and a sob rose again in his 
throat. 

“He is crazy ! ” said the people, laughing, 
yet a little scared ; for the priest at Zirl had 
said rightly, this is not an age of faith. At 
that moment there sounded, coming from the 
barracks, that used to be the Schloss in the old 
days of Kaiser Max and Mary of Burgundy, 
the sound of drums and trumpets and the 
tramp of marching feet. It was one of the 
corps of Jagers of Tyrol, going down from 
the avenue to the Rudolfplatz, with their band 
before them and their pennons streaming. It 
was a familiar sight, but it drew the street- 
throngs to it like magic : the age is not fond 
of dreamers, but it is very fond of drums. In 
almost a moment the bid dark arcades and v the 
river-side and the passages near were all empty, 
except for the women sitting at their stalls of 
fruit or gakes, or toys. They are wonderful 


FINDELKIND. 


33 


old arched arcades, like the cloisters of a cathe- 
dral more than anything else, and the shops 
under them are all homely and simple, — shops 
of leather, of furs, of clothes, of wooden play- 
things, of sweet and wholesome bread. They 
are very quaint, and kept by poor folks for poor 
folks ; but to the dazed eyes of Findelkind they 
looked like a forbidden paradise, for he was so 
hungry and so heart-broken, and he had never 
seen any bigger place than little Zirl. 

He stood and looked wistfully, but no one 
offered him anything. Close by was a stall of 
splendid purple grapes, but the old woman that 
kept it was busy knitting. She only called to 
him to stand out of her light. 

“ You look a poor brat ; have you a home ? ” 
said another woman, who sold bridles and whips 
and horses’ bells, and the like. 

Oh, yes, I have a home, — by Martins- 
wand,” said Findelkind, with a sigh. 

The woman looked at him sharply. “Your 
parents have sent you on an errand here ? ” 

“ No ; I have run away.” 

“ Run away ? Oh, you bad boy ! — unless, 
indeed, — are they cruel to you ” 

“ No ; very good.” 


34 


FINDELKIND. 


‘‘Are you a little rogue, then, or a thief ? ” 
“You are a bad woman to think such things,” 
said Findelkind, hotly, knowing himself on how 
innocent and sacred a quest he was. 

“ Bad ? I ? Oh, ho ! ” said the old dame, 
cracking one of her new whips in the air, “ I 
should like to make you jump about with this, 
you thankless little vagabond. Be off! ” 

Findelkind sighed again, his momentary 
anger passing ; for he had been born with a 
gentle temper, and thought himself to blame 
much more readily than he thought other peo- 
ple were, — as, indeed, every wise child does, 
only there are so few children — or men — that 
are wise. 

He turned his head away from the temptation 
of the bread and fruit stalls, for in truth hunger 
gnawed him terribly, and wandered a little to 
the left. From where he stood he could see 
the long, beautiful street of Teresa, with its 
oriels and arches, painted windows and gilded 
signs, and the steep, gray, dark mountains. clos- 
ing it in at the distance ; but the street fright- 
ened him, it looked so grand, and he knew it 
would tempt him ; so he went where he saw the 
green tops of some high elms and beeches, 


FINDELKIND. 


35 


The trees, like the dogs, seemed like friends. 
It was the human creatures that were cruel. 

At that moment there came out of the bar- 
rack gates, with great noise of trumpets and 
trampling of horses, a group of riders in gor- 
geous uniforms, with sabres and chains glancing 
and plumes tossing. It looked to Findelkind 
like a group of knights, — those knights who 
had helped and defended his namesake with 
their steel and their gold in the old days of 
the Arlberg quest. His heart gave a great 
leap, and he jumped on the dust for joy, and 
he ran forward and fell on his knees and 
waved his cap like a little mad thing, and cried 
out : 

“ Oh, dear knights ! oh, great soldiers ! help 
me! Fight for me, for the love of the saints! 
I have come all the way from Martinswand, 
and I am Findelkind, and I am trying to serve 
St. Christopher like Findelkind of Arlberg.” 

But his little swaying body and pleading 
hands and shouting voice and blowing curls 
frightened the horses ; one of them swerved 
and very nearly settled the woes of Findelkind 
for ever and aye by a kick. The soldier who 
rode the horse reined him in with difficulty. He 


36 


FINDELKIND. 


was at the head of the little staff, being indeed 
no less or more than the general commanding 
the garrison, which in this city is some fifteen 
thousand strong. An orderly sprang from his 
saddle and seized the child, and shook him, and 
swore at him. Findelkind was frightened ; but 
he shut his eyes and set his teeth, and said to 
himself that the martyrs must have had very 
much worse than these things to suffer in their 
pilgrimage. He had fancied these riders were 
knights, — such knights as the priest had shown 
him the likeness of in old picture-books, whose 
mission it had been to ride through the world 
succouring the weak and weary, and always 
defending the right. 

“ What are your swords for, if you are not 
knights ? ” he cried, desperately struggling in 
his captor’s grip, and seeing through his half- 
closed lids the sunshine shining on steel scab- 
bards. 

“ What does he want ? ” asked the officer in 
command of the garrison, whose staff all this 
bright and martial array was. He was riding 
out from the barracks to an inspection on the 
Rudolf platz. He was a young man, and had 
little children himself, and was half amused. 



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FINDELKIND. 39 

half touched, to see the tiny figure of the little 
dusty boy. 

“ I want to build a monastery, like Findel- 
kind of Arlberg, and to help the poor,” said our 
Findelkind, valorously, though his heart was beat- 
ing like that of a little mouse caught in a trap ; 
for the horses were trampling up the dust 
around him, and the orderly’s grip was hard. 

The officers laughed aloud ; and indeed he 
looked a poor little scrap of a figure, very ill 
able to help even himself. 

Why do you laugh ? ” cried Findelkind, 
losing his terror in his indignation, and inspired 
with the courage which a great earnestness 
always gives. “You should not laugh. If you 
were true knights, you would not laugh ; you 
would fight for me. I am little, I know, — I 
am very little, — but he was no bigger than I ; 
and see what great things he did. But the 
soldiers were good in those days ; they did not 
laugh and use bad words — ” 

And Findelkind, on whose shoulder the 
orderly’s hold was still fast, faced the horses, 
which looked to him as huge as Martinswand, 
and the swords, which he little doubted were 
to be sheathed in his heart. 


40 


FINDELKIND. 


The officers stared, laughed again, then whis- 
pered together, and Findelkind heard them say 
the word “crazed.” Findelkind, whose quick 
little ears were both strained like a mountain 
leveret’s, understood that the great men were 
saying among themselves that it was not safe 
for him to be about alone, and that it would be 
kinder to him to catch and cage him, — the 
general view with which the world regards 
enthusiasts. 

He heard, he understood ; he knew that they 
did not mean to help him, these men with the 
steel weapons and the huge steeds, but that they 
meant to shut him up in a prison — he, little 
free-born, forest-fed Findelkind. He wrenched 
himself out of the soldier’s grip, as the rabbit 
wrenches itself out of the jaws of the trap even 
at the cost of leaving a limb behind, shot be- 
tween the horses’ legs, doubled like a hunted 
thing, and spied a refuge. Opposite the avenue 
of gigantic poplars and pleasant stretches of 
grass shaded by other bigger trees, there stands 
a very famous church, famous alike in the 
annals of history and of art, — the church of 
the Franciscans, that holds the tomb of Kaiser 
Max, though, alas ! it holds not his ashes, as 


FINDELKIND. 


41 


his dying desire was that it should. The 
church stands here, a noble, sombre place, with 
the Silver Chapel of Philippina Wessler ad- 
joining it, and in front the fresh cool avenues 
that lead to the river and broad water-mead- 
ows and the grand Hall road bordered with the 
painted stations of the Cross. 

There were some peasants coming in from 
the country driving cows, and some burghers 
in their carts, with fat, slow horses ; some 
little children were at play under the poplars 
and the elms ; great dogs were lying about on 
the grass ; everything was happy and at peace, 
except the poor throbbing heart of little Findel- 
kind, who thought the soldiers were coming 
after him to lock him up as mad, and ran and 
ran as fast as his trembling legs would carry 
him, making for sanctuary, as, in the old by- 
gone days that he loved, many a soul less inno- 
cent than his had done. The wide doors of 
the Hofkirche stood open, and on the steps 
lay a black-and-tan hound, watching no doubt 
for its master or mistress, who had gone within 
to pray. Findelkincl, in his terror, vaulted 
over the dog, and into the church tumbled 
headlong. 


42 


FINDELKIND. 


It seemed quite dark, after the brilliant sun- 
shine on the river and the grass ; his forehead 
touched the stone floor as he fell, and as he 
raised himself and stumbled forward, reverent 
and bareheaded, looking for the altar to cling 
to when the soldiers should enter to seize him, 
his uplifted eyes fell on the great tomb. 

The tomb seems entirely to fill the church, 
as, with its twenty-four guardian figures around 
it, it towers up in the twilight that reigns here 
even at midday. There are a stern majesty 
and grandeur in it which dwarf every other 
monument and mausoleum. It is grim, it is 
rude, it is savage, with the spirit of the rough 
ages that created it ; but it is great with their 
greatness, it is heroic with their heroism, it is 
simple with their simplicity. 

As the awestricken eyes of the terrified child 
fell on the mass of stone and bronze, the sight 
smote him breathless. The mailed warriors 
standing around it, so motionless, so solemn, 
filled him with a frozen, nameless fear. He 
had never a doubt that they were the dead 
arisen. The foremost that met his eyes were 
Theodoric and Arthur ; the next, grim Rudolf, 
father of a dynasty of emperors. There, lean- 


FINDELKIND. 


43 


ing on their swords, the three gazed down 
on him, armoured, armed, majestic, serious, 
guarding the empty grave, which to the child, 
who knew nothing of its history, seemed a bier ; 
and at the feet of Theodoric, who alone of them 
all looked young and merciful, poor little des- 
perate Findelkind fell with a piteous sob, and 
cried, I am not mad ! Indeed, indeed, I am 
not mad ! ” 

He did not know that these grand figures 
were but statues of bronze. He was quite sure 
they were the dead, arisen, and meeting there, 
around that tomb on which the solitary kneel- 
ing knight watched and prayed, encircled, as by 
a wall of steel, by these his comrades. He was 
not frightened, he was rather comforted and 
stilled, as with a sudden sense of some deep 
calm and certain help. 

Findelkind, without knowing that he was like 
so many dissatisfied poets and artists much 
bigger than himself, dimly felt in his little tired 
mind how beautiful and how gorgeous and how 
grand the world must have been when heroes 
and knights like these had gone by in its daily 
sunshine and its twilight storms. No wonder 
Findelkind of Arlberg had found his pilgrimage 


44 


FINDELKIND. 


SO fair, when if he had needed any help he had 
only had to kneel and clasp these firm, mailed 
limbs, these strong cross-hilted swords, in the 
name of Christ and of the poor. 

Theodoric seemed to look down on him with 
benignant eyes from under the raised visor ; 
and our poor Findelkind, weeping, threw his 
small arms closer and closer around the bronze 
knees of the heroic figure, and sobbed aloud, 
“ Help me, help me ! Oh, turn the hearts of 
the people to me, and help me to do good ! ” 

But Theodoric answered nothing. 

There was no sound in the dark, hushed 
church ; the gloom grew darker over Findel- 
kind’s eyes ; the mighty forms of monarchs and 
of heroes grew dim before his sight. He lost 
consciousness, and fell prone upon the stones 
at Theodoric’s feet ; for he had fainted from 
hunger and emotion. 

When he awoke it was quite evening ; there 
was a lantern held over his head ; voices were 
muttering curiously and angrily ; bending over 
him were two priests, a sacristan of the church, 
and his own father. His little wallet lay by 
him on the stones, always empty. 

Boy of mine ! were you mad ? ” cried his 



“ ‘ BOY OF MINE ! WERE YOU MAD ? ’ ’ 







FINDELKIND. 


47 


father, half in rage, half in tenderness. '‘The 
chase you have led me ! — and your mother 
thinking you were drowned ! — and all the 
working day lost, running after old women’s 
tales of where they had seen you ! Oh, little 
fool, little fool ! what was amiss with Mar- 
tinswand, that you must leave it ? ” 

Findelkind slowly and feebly rose, and sat up 
on the pavement, and looked up, not at his 
father, but at the knight Theodoric. 

" I thought they would help me to keep 
the poor,” he muttered, feebly, as he glanced 
at his own wallet. "And it is empty, — 
empty.” 

" And are we not poor enough ^ ” cried his 
father, with natural impatience, ready to tear 
his hair with vexation at having such a little 
idiot for a son. " Must you rove afield to 
find poverty to help, when it sits cold enough, 
the Lord knows, at our own hearth ? Oh, little 
ass, little dolt, little maniac, fit only for a mad- 
house, talking to iron figures and taking them 
for real men ! What have I done, O heaven, 
that I should be afflicted thus ? ” 

And the poor man wept, being a good affec- 
tionate soul, but not very wise, and believing 


48 


FINDELKIND. 


that his boy was mad. Then, seized with 
sudden rage once more, at thought of his day 
all wasted, and its hours harassed and miser- 
able through searching for the lost child, he 
plucked up the light, slight figure of Findelkind 
in his own arms, and, with muttered thanks and 
excuses to the sacristan of the church, bore the 
boy out with him into the evening air, and 
lifted him into a cart, which stood there with a 
horse harnessed to one side of the pole, as 
the country-people love to do, to the risk of 
their own lives and their neighbours’. Findel- 
kind said never a word ; he was as dumb as 
Theodoric had been to him ; he felt stupid, 
heavy, half blind ; his father pushed him some 
bread, and he ate it by sheer instinct, as a 
lost animal will do ; the cart jogged on, the 
stars shone, the great church vanished in the 
gloom of night. 

As they went through the city toward the 
riverside along the homeward way, never a word 
did his father, who was a silent man at all times, 
address to him. Only once, as they jogged over 
the bridge, he spoke. 

^^Son,” he asked, “did you run away truly 
thinking to please God and help the poor ? ” 


FINDELKIND. 


49 


“Truly I did!” answered Findelkind, with a 
sob in his throat. 

“ Then thou wert an ass I ” said his father. 
“ Didst never think of thy mother’s love and of 
my toil ? Look at home.” 

Findelkind was mute. The drive was very 
long, backward by the same way, with the river 
shining in the moonlight, and the mountains 
half covered with the clouds. 

It was ten by the bells of Zirl when they 
came once more under the solemn shadow of 
grave Martinswand. There were lights moving 
about his house, his brothers and sisters were 
still up, his mother ran out into the road, weep- 
ing and laughing with fear and joy. 

Findelkind himself said nothing. 

He hung his head. 

They were too fond of him to scold him or to 
jeer at him ; they made him go quickly to his 
bed, and his mother made him a warm milk 
posset, and kissed him. 

“ We will punish thee to-morrow, naughty 
and cruel one,” said his parent. “But thou art 
punished enough already, for in thy place little 
Stefan had the sheep, and he has lost Katte’s 
lambs, — the beautiful twin lambs I I dare not 


50 


FINDELKIND. 


tell thy father to-night. Dost hear the poor 
thing mourn Do not go afield for thy duty 
again.” 

A pang went through the heart of Findelkind, 
as if a knife had pierced it. He loved Katte 
better than almost any other living thing, and 
she was bleating under his window childless 
and alone. They were such beautiful lambs, 
to3 ! — lambs that his father had promised should 
never be killed, but be reared to swell the flock. 

Findelkind cowered down in his. bed, and felt 
wretched beyond all wretchedness. He had 
been brought back ; his wallet was empty ; 
and Katte’s lambs were lost. He could not 
sleep. 

His pulses were beating like so many steam- 
hammers ; he felt as if his body were all one 
great throbbing heart. His brothers, who lay 
in the same chamber with him, were sound 
asleep ; very soon his father and mother snored 
also, on the other side of the wall. Findelkind 
was alone wide awake, watching the big white 
moon sail past his little casement, and hearing 
Katte bleat. 

Where were her poor twin lambs ? 

The night was bitterly cold, for it was already 


FINDELKIND. 


51 


far on in autumn ; the rivers had swollen and 
flooded many fields, the snow for the last week 
had fallen quite low down on the mountainsides. 

Even if still living, the little lambs would die, 
out on such a night without the mother or food 
and shelter of any sort. Findelkind, whose 
vivid brain always saw everything that he imag- 
ined as if it were being acted before his eyes, in 
fancy saw his two dear lambs floating dead down 
the swollen tide, entangled in rushes on the 
flooded shore, or fallen with broken limbs upon 
a crest of rocks. He saw them so plainly that 
scarcely could he hold back his breath from 
screaming aloud in the still night and answer- 
ing the mourning wail of the desolate mother. 

At last he could bear it no longer : his head 
burned, and his brain seemed whirling round ; 
at a bound he leaped out of bed quite noise- 
lessly, slid into his sheepskins, and stole out 
as he had done the night before, hardly know- 
ing what he did. Poor Katte was mourning in 
the wooden shed with the other sheep, and the 
wail of her sorrow sounded sadly across the loud 
roar of the rushing river. 

The moon was still high. 

Above, against the sky, black and awful with 


52 


FINDELKIND. 


clouds floating over its summit, was the great 
Martinswand. 

Findelkind this time called the big dog Wald- 
mar to him, and, with the dog beside him, went 
once more out into the cold and the gloom, whilst 
his father and mother, his brothers and sisters, 
were sleeping, and poor childless Katte alone 
was awake. 

He looked up at the mountain and then across 
the water-swept meadows to the river. He was 
in doubt which way to take. Then he thought 
that in all likelihood the lambs would have been 
seen if they had wandered the river way, and 
even little Stefan would have had too much 
sense to let them go there. So he crossed the 
road and began to climb Martinswand. 

With the instinct of the born mountaineer, 
he had brought out his crampons with him, and 
had now fastened them on his feet ; he knew 
every part and ridge of the mountains, and had 
more than once climbed over to that very spot 
where Kaiser Max had hung in peril of his life. 

On second thoughts he bade Waldmar go 
back to the house. The dog was a clever moun- 
taineer, too, but Findelkind did not wish to 
lead him into danger. I have done the wrong. 


FINDELKIND. 


53 


and I will bear the brunt,” he said to himself ; 
for he felt as if he had killed Katte’s children, 
and the weight of the sin was like lead on his 
heart, and he would not kill good Waldmar, too. 

His little lantern did not show much light, 
and as he went higher upwards he lost sight of 
the moon. The cold was nothing to him, be- 
cause the clear still air was that in which he had 
been reared ; and the darkness he did not mind, 
because he was used to that also ; but the weight 
of sorrow upon him he scarcely knew how to 
bear, and how to find two tiny lambs in this vast 
waste of silence and shadow would have puzzled 
and wearied older minds than his. Garibaldi 
and all his household, old soldiers tried and true, 
sought all night once upon Caprera in such a 
quest, in vain. 

If he could only have awakened his brother 
Stefan to ask him which way they had gone ! 
but then, to be sure, he remembered, Stefan 
must have told that to all those who had been 
looking for the lambs from sunset to nightfall. 
All alone he began the ascent. 

Time and again, in the glad spring-time and 
the fresh summer weather, he had driven his 
flock upwards to eat the grass that grew, in the 


54 


FINDELKIND. 


clefts of the rocks and on the broad green alps. 
The sheep could not climb to the highest points ; 
but the goats did, and he with them. Time and 
again he had lain on his back in these upper- 
most heights, with the lower clouds behind him 
and the black wings of the birds and the crows 
almost touching his forehead, as he lay gazing 
up into the blue depth of the sky, and dream- 
ing, dreaming, dreaming. 

He would never dream any more now, he 
thought to himself. His dreams had cost Katte 
her lambs, and the world of the dead Findel- 
kind was gone for ever : gone were all the 
heroes and knights ; gone all the faith and the 
force ; gone every one who cared for the dear 
Christ and the poor in pain. 

The bells of Zirl were ringing midnight. 
Findelkind heard, and wondered that only two 
hours had gone by since his mother had kissed 
him in his bed. It seemed to him as if long, 
long nights had rolled away, and he had lived 
a hundred years. 

He did not feel any fear of the dark calm 
night, lit now and then by silvery gleams of 
moon and stars. The mountain was his old 
familiar friend, and the ways of it had no more 


FINDELKIND. 


55 


terror for him than these hills here used to have 
for the bold heart of Kaiser Max. Indeed, all 
he thought of was Katte, — Katte and the lambs. 
He knew the way that the sheep-tracks ran ; the 
sheep could not climb so high as the goats ; and 
he knew, too, that little Stefan could not climb 
so high as he. So he began his search low down 
upon Martinswand. 

After midnight the cold increased ; there were 
snow-clouds hanging near, and they opened over 
his head, and the soft snow came flying along. 
For himself he did not mind it, but alas for the 
lambs ! — if it covered them, how would he find 
them ? And if they slept in it, they were dead. 

It was bleak and bare on the mountain-side, 
though there were still patches of grass such as 
the flocks liked, that had grown since the hay 
was cut. The frost of the night made the 
stone slippery, and even the irons gripped it 
with difficulty ; and there was a strong wind 
rising like a giant’s breath, and blowing his 
small horn lantern to and fro. 

Now and then he quaked a little with fear, — 
not fear of the night or the mountains, but of 
strange spirits and dwarfs and goblins of ill 
repute, said to haunt Martinswand after night- 


LofC. 


56 


FINDELKIND. 


fall. Old women had told him of such things, 
though the priest always said that they were 
only foolish tales, there being nothing on God’s 
earth wicked save men and women who had 
not clean hearts and hands. Findelkind be- 
lieved the priest ; still, all alone on the side of 
the mountain with the snowflakes flying around 
him, he felt a nervous thrill that made him 
tremble and almost turn backward. Almost, 
but not quite ; for he thought of Katte and the 
poor little lambs lost — and perhaps dead — 
through his fault. 

The path went zigzag and was very steep ; 
the Arolla pines swayed their boughs in his 
face ; stones that lay in his path unseen in the 
gloom made him stumble. Now and then a 
large bird of the night flew by with a rushing 
sound ; the air grew so cold that all Mart ins- 
wand might have been turning to one huge 
glacier. All at once he heard through the 
stillness — for there is nothing so still as a 
mountainside in snow — a little pitiful bleat. 
All his terrors vanished ; all his memories of 
ghost-tales passed away ; his heart gave a leap 
of joy ; he was sure it was the cry of the 
lambs. He stopped to listen more surely. He 


FINDELKIND. 


57 


was now many score of feet above the level of 
his home and of Zirl ; he was, as nearly as he 
could judge, half-way as high as where the 
cross in the cavern marks the spot of the 
Kaiser’s peril. 

The little 
bleat sounded 
above him, 
and it was 
very feeble 
and faint. 

Findelkind 
set his lan- 
tern down, 
braced him- 
self up by 
drawing 
tighter his old 
leathern 
girdle, set his 
sheepskin cap 
firm on his forehead, and went toward the 
sound as far as he could judge that it might 
be. He was out of the woods now ; there were 
only a few straggling pines rooted here and 
there in a mass of loose-lying rock and slate ; 



58 


FINDELKIND. 


SO much he could tell by the light of the 
lantern, and the lambs by the bleating, seemed 
still above him. 

It does not, perhaps, seem very hard labour 
to hunt about by a dusky light upon a desolate 
mountainside ; but when the snow is falling 
fast, — when the light is only a small circle, 
wavering, yellowish on the white, — when 
around is a wilderness of loose stones and 
yawning clefts, — when the air is ice and the 
hour is past midnight, — the task is not a light 
one for a man ; and Findelkind was a child, 
like that Findelkind that was in heaven. 

Long, very long was his search ; he grew 
hot and forgot all fear except a spasm of terror 
lest his light should burn low and die out. 
The bleating had quite ceased now, and there 
was not even a sigh to guide him ; but he knew 
that near him the lambs must be, and he did 
not waver or despair. 

He did not pray ; praying in the morning 
had been no use ; but he trusted in God, and 
he laboured hard, toiling to and fro, seeking in 
every nook and behind each stone, and straining 
every muscle and nerve, till the sweat rolled in 
a briny dew off his forehead, and his curls 


FINDELKIND. 


59 


dripped with wet. At last, with a scream of 
joy, he touched some soft close wool that 
gleamed white as the white snow. He knelt 
down on the ground, and peered behind the 
stone by the full light of his lantern ; there 
lay the little lambs, — two little brothers, 
twin brothers, huddled close together, asleep. 
Asleep ? He was sure they were asleep, for 
they were so silent and still. 

He bowed over them, and kissed them, and 
laughed, and cried, and kissed them again. 
Then a sudden horror smote him ; they were 
so very still. There they lay, cuddled close, 
one on another, one little white head on each 
little white body, — drawn closer than ever 
together, to try and get warm. 

He called to them, he touched them, then 
he caught them up in his arms, and kissed 
them again, and again, and again. Alas ! they 
were frozen and dead. Never again would 
they leap in the long green grass, and frisk 
with each other, and lie happy by Katte’s side ; 
they had died calling for their mother, and in 
the long, cold, cruel night, only death had 
answered. 

Findelkind did not weep, or scream, or 


6o 


FINDELKIND. 


tremble ; his heart seemed frozen, like the 
dead lambs. 

It was he who had killed them. 

He rose up and gathered them in his arms, 
and cuddled them 
in the skirts of his 
sheepskin tunic, 
and cast his staff 
away that he might 
carry them, and so, 
thus burdened 
with their weight, 
set his face to the 
snow and the wind 
once more, and 
began his down- 
ward way. 

Once a great sob 
shook him ; that 
was all. Now he 
had no fear. 

The night might have been noonday, the 
snow-storm might have been summer, for aught 
that he knew or cared. 

Long and weary was the way, and often he 
stumbled and had to rest ; often the terrible 



FINDELKIND. 


6l 


sleep of the snow lay heavy on his eyelids, and 
he longed to lie down and be at rest, as the 
little brothers were ; often it seemed to him 
that he would never reach home again. But 
he shook the lethargy off him, and resisted the 
longing, and held on his way ; he knew that his 
mother would mourn for him as Katte mourned 
for the lambs. At length, through all difficulty 
and danger, when his light had spent itself, and 
his strength had well-nigh spent itself too, his 
feet touched the old highroad. There were 
flickering torches and many people, and loud 
cries around the church, as there had been four 
hundred years before, when the last sacrament 
had been said in the valley for the hunter-king 
in peril above. 

His mother, being sleepless and anxious, had 
risen long before it was dawn, and had gone to 
the children’s chamber, and had found the bed 
of Findelkind empty once more. 

He came into the midst of the people with 
the two little lambs in his arms, and he heeded 
neither the outcries of neighbours nor the 
frenzied joy of his mother; his eyes looked 
straight before him, and his face was white 
like the snow. 


62 


FINDELKIND. 


** I killed them,” he said, and then two great 
tears rolled down his cheeks and fell on the 
little cold bodies of the two little dead brothers. 

Findelkind was very ill for many nights and 
many days after that. 

Whenever he spoke in his fever he always 
said, “ I killed them ! ” 

Never anything else. 

So the dreary winter months went by, while 
the deep snow filled up lands and meadows, 
and covered the great mountains from summit 
to base, and all around Martins wand was quite 
still, and now and then the post went by to 
Zirl, and on the holy-days the bells tolled ; that 
was all. His mother sat between the stove and 
his bed with a sore heart ; and his father, as he 
went to and fro between the walls of beaten 
snow from the wood-shed to the cattle-byre, 
was sorrowful, thinking to himself the child 
would die, and join that earlier Findelkind 
whose home was with the saints. 

But the child did not die. 

He lay weak and wasted and almost motion- 
less a long time ; but slowly, as the springtime 
drew near, and the snows on the lower hills 
loosened, and the abounding waters coursed 


FINDELKIND. 


63 


green and crystal clear down all the sides of the 
hills, Findelkind revived as the earth did, and 
by the time the new grass was springing, and 
the first blue of the gentian gleamed on the 
alps, he was well. 

But to this day he seldom plays and scarcely 
ever laughs. His face is sad, and his eyes have 
a look of trouble. 

Sometimes the priest of Zirl says of him to 
others, ‘‘He will be a great poet or a great 
hero some day.” Who knows ? 

Meanwhile, in the heart of the child there 
remains always a weary pain, that lies on his 
childish life as a stone may lie on a flower. 

“ I killed them ! ” he says often to himself, 
thinking of the two little white brothers frozen 
to death on Martinswand that cruel night ; and 
he does the things that are told him, and is 
obedient, and tries to be content with the 
humble daily duties that are his lot, and when 
he says his prayers at bedtime always ends 
them so : 

“Dear God, do let the little lambs play with 
the other Findelkind that is in heaven.” 


THE END. 



NEW JUVENILES 


’Tilda Jane 

By marshall SAUNDERS 

AUTHOR OF “ BEAUTIFUL JOE,” “ FOR HIS 
COUNTRY,” ETC. 

Fully illustrated 

I vol., i2mo, ^1.50 

A charming and wholesome story for girls, handled 
with unusual charm and skill, which was issued serially 
in the ToutFs Companion. 

’Tilda Jane is a runaway orphan from a Maine asylum, 
who wanders over the Canadian border into the settle- 
ments of the habitants. The simple lives of the peasants, 
their line characters and racial traits give a characteristic 
charm to the story, and the delightful girl heroine will 
endear herself to young and old readers. 

SEND FOR CIRCULARS, ETC. 



NEW JUVENILES 


THE 

Rosamond Tales 

By CUYLER REYNOLDS 

With many full-page illustrations from original photo- 
graphs by the author, together with a frontispiece from a 
drawing by Maud Humphreys, 

Large i2mo, cloth, ^1.50 

These are just the bedtime stories that children always 
ask for, but do not always get. Rosamond and Rosalind 
are the hero and heroine of many happy adventures in 
town and on their grandfather’s farm ; and the happy 
listeners to their story^ will unconsciously absorb a vast 
amount of interesting knowledge of birds, animals, and 
flowers, just the things about which the curiosity of 
children from four to twelve years old is most insatiable. 
The book will be a boon to tired mothers, as a delight to 
wide-awake children. 


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NEW JUVENILES 

THE 

Woodranger Tales 

Volume III. 

The Hero of the Hills 

By G. WALDO BROWNE 
Volume I. 

The Woodranger 

By G. WALDO BROWNE 
Volume II. 

The Young Gunbearer 

By G. WALDO BROWNE 

Each large i2mo, cloth, fully illustrated, ^i-OO 

There is the reality of history behind these stories, 
the successful series of ‘‘Woodranger Tales,” the scope 
and trend of which are accurately set forth in the title. 
While full of adventure, the interest in which sometimes 
rises to the pitch of excitement, the stories are not sensa- 
tional, for Mr. Browne writes with dignity, if with live- 
liness. The books will not fail to interest any lively, 
wholesome-minded boy. 

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NEW JUVENILES 


THE 

Cosy Corner Series 

A SERIES OF CHARMING ILLUSTRATED 
JUVENILES BY WELL-KNOWN AUTHORS 

We shall issue ten new volumes in this well-known 
series of child classics, and announce four as follows : 

A Little Puritan Pioneer 

By EDITH ROBINSON 
Author of '‘A Loyal Little Maid,” “A Little Puri- 
tan^s First Christmas,” etc. 

Madam Liberality 

By MRS. EWING 

Author of ''Jackanapes,” "A Great Emergency,” 
"Story of a Short Life,” etc., etc. 

A Bad Penny 

By JOHN T. WHEELWRIGHT 

The other seven will include new stories by Louise 
de la Ramee, Miss Mulock, Nellie Hellis, Will Allen- 
Dromgoole, etc., etc. 

Forty-four volumes previously published 


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NEW JUVENILES 

Our Devoted Friend 
the Dog 

By SARAH K. BOLTON 

AUTHOR OF ‘‘ GIRLS WHO HAVE BECOME 
FAMOUS,” ETC. 

Fully illustrated with mariy reproductions from original 
photographs 

I vol., small quarto, $1.50 

This book of the dog and his friends does for the 
canine member of the household what Helen M. Win- 
slow’s book, ‘‘Concerning Cats,” did for the feline. 
No one who cares for dogs — and that class includes 
nearly all who do not care for cats, and some who do — 
will admit that the subject of Mrs. Bolton’s book is a less 
felicitous choice than that of its predecessor ; while the 
author’s well-known ability as a writer and lecturer, as 
well as her sympathy with her subject, are a sufficient 
guarantee of a happy treatment. 

SEND FOR CIRCULARS, ETC. 



L. C. Page & Company’s 


Cosy Corner Series 

OF 

Charming Juveniles 


4 

Each one volume, J6mo, cloth, Illustrated, 50 cents 


Ole Mammy's Torment, By Annie Fellows-Johnston 
Author of “ The Little Colonel,” etc. 

The Little Colonel, By Annie Fellows-Johnston. 
Author of “ Big Brother.” 

Big Brother, By Annie Fellows-Johnston. 

Author of “ The Little Colonel,” etc. 

The Gate of the Giant Scissors, By Annie Fellows- 
Johnston. 

Author of “ The Little Colonel,” etc. 

Two Little Knights of Kentucky, who were “The Little 
Colonel’s ” neighbors. By Annie Fellows-Johnston. 
A sequel to “ The Little Colonel.” 

The Story of Dago, By Annie Fellows-Johnston. 
Author of “The Little Colonel,” etc. 

Farmer Brown and the Birds, By Frances Margaret 
Fox. a little story which teaches children that the birds 
are man’s best friends. 



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